I want to make 8-bit art for a game.

[Cjimmy99]

Does anyone know a good free program for making 8-bit art? I can't imagine it being too hard to make 8-bit art. Anyway, thanks in advance!

[willy]

I think the NES has 32 colors. 16 for sprites, and 16 for background.

You can use the MMF editor or any other art program. Just make a quick color palette and stick to it for the entire frame. You can switch palette on different frames, just don't exceed 32 colors.

EDIT:
But that's the NES. Read this here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/8-bit_color

[Cjimmy99]

Just so everyone knows willy's answer was too advanced for me because I know nothing about computer art, so if somone wants to give me a more BASIC answer that would be fine.

[LB]

Don't use more than 256 different colors. You can set your application to 256 color mode.

[Bruto]

You can use Photoshop with PENCIL tool. It has rough drawing with cursor and as LB and willy said, you need to choose a palette then.
Look around for pixel art tutorials and you can get a good start from.

[MuddyMole]

And since when was Photoshop FREE?

I already posted this in the other thread, but if you just want to do pixelart, then "Pixelformer" is a really nice little app, and a huge improvement over MMF2's built-in image editor or MS Paint.
http://www.qualibyte.com/pixelformer/

"The Gimp" and "Graphics Gale" are the other main free alternatives, but I personally don't like either of them.

[mobichan]

To clarify, are you looking to make "8-bit game" art or simply "8-bit art"? The former being an for 8-bit console and the latter being art that is limited to 256 colors.

In either case, making pixel art is simple with any tool that allows you to paint a single pixel (usually the pencil tool in graphics programs). But I wouldn't say it is "easy" to make pixel art unless you have a good amount of art skill and understand the basics of making pixel art from a design standpoint.